United Nations, focused on international law Essay

United Nations, focused on international law - Essay Example At the end of World War II, fifty-one countries committed to preserving peace through international cooperation and collective security established the UN on 24th October 1945. Today, nearly every nation in the world belongs to the UN and its membership totals 191 countries.Each member country has to obligate to all the requirements of the UN charter. This charter is an international treaty designed to protect future generations from the scourge and curse of war and written to affirm fundamental human rights. The purposes of the United Nations, as set forth in the Charter, are to maintain international peace and security; to develop friendly relations among nations; to cooperate in solving international economic, social, cultural and humanitarian problems and in promoting respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; and to be a center for harmonizing the actions of nations in attaining these ends.The United Nations comprises of six main bodies. Five of them - the General Assemb ly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, the Trusteeship Council and the Secretariat - are based at UN Headquarters in New York. The sixth, the International Court of Justice, is located at The Hague in the Netherlands.The General Assembly makes decisions on the key issues and world's most pressing problems, and is represented by each member nation with the account of one vote each. The Security Council carries out decisions pertaining to international peace and security. ... There are certain other UN offices and programmes that work to improvise the living conditions of the world and the people on the whole. Two such important offices to mention are United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF). The UNESCO was founded in November 1945 with the aim to build peace in the world through knowledge, social progress, exchange and mutual understanding among peoples. The UNICEF was created in December 1946 by the United Nations to provide food, clothing and health care to European children facing famine and disease in the aftermath of the Second World War. Their mandate is to advocate for the protection of children's rights, to help meet their basic needs and to expand their opportunities to reach their full potential. The UN provides the means to help resolve international conflicts and formulate policies on matters affecting all of us. In this process, all the Member States have a right to be heard and to cast a vote, irrespective of their size, wealth and economic positions, political views and social systems. UN and International Law As per its prime objective of maintaining peace and security throughout the world, and managing and resolving any conflicts arising out of international disputes, United Nations has undertaken the progressive codification and development of international law by forming a comprehensive body of international law. The over 500 conventions, treaties and standards resulting from this work have provided a framework for promoting international peace and security and economic and social development. They legally bind states that

Explain the different roles played by (i) the central bank, (ii) Essay

Explain the different roles played by (i) the central bank, (ii) depository institutions, and (iii) depositors in the determina - Essay Example For example, there is a strong proof that when money increases rapidly in an economy, there develops a direct relation between money-supply and long-term price inflation. On the other hand, a decrease in the level of money supply in a country leads to a decrease in economic activity, tightened spending levels and a fall in consumer demand. The quantity theory of money states that money supply has a relationship that is directly proportional in nature to the price level (Friedman, 1956). Different institutions have different but correlated roles to play in the determination of money supply in a country and the global economy. Examples of such institutions are the central bank and depository institutions. Depositors also have a part to play in this. Roles of the central bank Every country has a central bank that monitors and determines money supply in the country’s economy. In the US, the money supply is determined by the US Federal Reserve, the central banking system of the US. Its role is to foster economic growth in the US by regulating the actions of private banks and stabilizing the money supply. The Federal Reserve, also known as Fed, uses the expansive monetary policy as a guide in expanding the US money supply (Shin, 2009). Using the expansive monetary policy, the Federal Reserve channels more reserves to the banking system so as to allow private banks more liquidity and to make sure that they have the required ability to issue loans. In the UK, determination of money supply is the function of the Bank of England while that of the counties under the EU is the European Central Bank (ECB) (Burda and Wyplosz, 1997). In order to stabilize an economy in a country, the central bank has the power to determine the level of money stock through the operation of different monetary policies. These policies include reserve requirements, open market operations and discount rates. The most dominant among the three monetary policies is the open market operations p olicy. According to Howells and Bain (2009), an open market operation is a situation in which the central bank purchases or trades government securities for cash in an effort to contract or expand the total money supply. Money supply in the country will increase if the central bank purchases government securities but it will contract if the central bank sells government securities. The responsibility of the central bank in relation to fractional reserve banking is to hold a particular fraction of all deposits. This can be in account with the central bank or in cash. In order to alter money supply, the central bank alters the percentage of total deposits that needs to be held by commercial banks. In this way, the central bank can increase the monetary base in a country by reducing the reserve requirements or reduce the monetary base by increasing the reserve requirements (Mishkin, 1998). The central banks also determine money supply in a country by controlling discount rates. This is possible because the central bank in every country supplies commercial banks with the money they require to meet consumer demand. Therefore, the central bank can meet and control consumer demand for money by controlling the national interest rates. For example, the consumer demand for money will increase greatly if the interest rates decrease while a decrease in consumer demand for money will arise if the interest rates increase. Roles of depository institutions By definition, depository

Supporting people with long term health conditions

Supporting people with long term health conditions This report reflects on the care needs of 67 year old Kingsley, at 55 he was diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes then at 65 Kingsley suffered a stroke. After a lengthy stay in hospital he was moved to a nursing home where he currently lives, he is not happy in the nursing home and wishes to be discharged and return home to the care of his wife. He displays his unhappiness to care staff with bouts of anger and frustration. He has a social worker assigned to his case who is currently undecided if Kingsley should return home to his wife, he questions the layout of the home and his wifes ability to cope with Kingsleys care needs. Kingsley and his wife have some difficult decisions to make and should be able to discuss these with the social worker as these will have a fundamental impact on where he lives as this will be instrumental to his wellbeing. Living with a long term health condition can have its challenges when receiving health care, its paramount that a care user receives the correct level of support and information available. A psycho sociological perspective offers a holistic approach which addresses an individuals needs and an anthropological perspective which offers a biological study of the human being. A psycho sociological perspective addresses an individuals psychological health and wellbeing needs which are individual to functioning within human society. This perspective highlights that factors such as age, gender, environmental living conditions and the individual differences that people face are to be considered in health needs and care issues. A psycho-social approach to public health aims to incorporate the environment which will address the health of groups of people by social context, social class, location and how accessible they are to local resources. In the past this has been referred to as the social model of health (K217, Learning Guide 2, p43). The structure of the social model of health aims to make health services more affective, accessible and acceptable to individuals. The components are as follows (K217, Learning Guide 2, p43). To acknowledge the influence that health has on political, economic, social, psychological, cultural and environmental factors and also biological factors. To improve health a focus must be placed on the socio-economic environment. To achieve community participation with shared decision making between lay people and practitioners. Health services to collaborate with other government agencies and sectors. Commitment to equity and accountability in health. The use of evidence which is qualitative and quantitative. The concept of this perspective is that the focus of social causes are linked to illness rather genetics. If the social causes which are causing a detrimental effect on health are addressed then a better quality of life and sense of wellbeing are to be achieved. In Kingsley case he is not socially active because of the environment he is currently living in, which is restricting him from participating in any social networks, which gives the practitioners power over him so he is then not part of the decision making regarding his wellbeing. Holism perspective The practice of holism is to recognise that each persons needs are unique to ones own identity. It acknowledges that focus is to be given to lifestyles and choices which have an impact on health and illness. The approach links all aspects of a persons physical, mental and emotional state to create a composition of a state of health and illness. The approach of a biomedical perspective will address medical conditions with a biological, anatomy, and a physiology view but ignores an individuals needs, as a holism approach would address the individuals needs which would have an effect on lifestyles and choices. So a Biomedical perspective has a place in some health conditions such as Diabetes which will address the medical needs such as insulin. But a holistic approach will identify the whole person combining their mind, body and spirit. This can be helpful for practitioners to understand how a Diabetic may be feeling with effects of injecting insulin, are they coping with self management of the condition. The whole person approach to care is to give service users the ability to move on from the professional dominance in the doctor centred model and to achieve the self care model which is to encourage independence. (K217, Learning Guide 2, p42). Discussion. The contribution of theory. Do theories have a place in health and social care services and how can they help people like Kingsley who is suffering from a long term health condition. Theories in health and social care are developed from two perspectives Good research and medical engagements which results in theories from evidence. Generalised practice and an understanding of experience within a profession, these theorises are developed from practical experiences. Theories in understanding long term health conditions can be found in two perspectives bio medical and the social model of health. The bio medical approach is that the body functions normally but when things go wrong a specialist can repair the body; its focus is that biological problems can be addressed with medicine. The social model of health recognises biological factors but also includes the recognition of the influence of health being a matter of psychological and social addressing the wellbeing of an individual. If just a bio medical approach to theory was taken of Kingsleys situation he would have been diagnosed with two long term health conditions a stroke and type two diabetes by a practitioner then undergone biological treatment in hospital, were tests were taken and symptoms were controlled with medication. He is now living with two conditions controlled by medication. Bio medical may adapt mechanical metaphors which presume that a practitioners approach is to be an engineer and to fix what is malfunctioning with medication (K219, leaning guide 1, p36). The N.H.S. point out that a stroke is a medical emergency and should be diagnosed as soon as possible this would be in a bio medical environment. A bio medical view would be taken to determine the emergency treatment needed and also for after care with medication, therapists, physiotherapist and G.Ps. The N.H.S also highlight that the social model of health should be incorporated into a patients social care needs social workers would ass ess a patient and their carers needs and offer services such as meals on wheels and home care services (N.H.S. 2011). A purely social view of theory to long term health conditions would offer Kingsley and his with sociological support in dealing with his conditions addressing needs for his wellbeing. Kingsley has experienced a change to his identity, because of his illness he feels he can no longer contribute in society. Kingsleys illness has made it impossible for him to work so he now relies on the welfare benefit system so his identity has changed from a working man providing for his family to the sick role. The sick role can be identified when an ill person becomes exempt from a social role of responsibilities examples are because of illness, a sick person will not get better without being taken care of and the sick person will want to overcome illness and should be obligated to seek the correct professional help to deal with an illness (Parsons, 1951, p.294). This theory of the sick role has an element of social care and bio medical, society will address an ill persons needs with benefits and c are issues and a biological factor will be present with medication. What can be learnt from research and practice guidelines? Research show that suffers from a long term health condition such as a stroke may face physical disabilities and suffer from social exclusion which can lead to spoiled identities. The Stroke Association commits approximately two and a half million pounds per year in to research of stroke prevention and treatment .Two key achievements are (The Stroke Association 2011). Staying physically fit after 40 cuts risk of a stroke. People who are physically fit after the age of 40 can lower their risk of stroke by as much as 50 percent, compared to people who arent as physically fit (The Stroke Association 2011). The benefit of occupational therapy for stroke care home residents. A recent study funded by the Stroke Association has shown how beneficial even a small amount of occupational therapy can be to residents in care homes who have had a stroke. The study, carried out is extremely significant as the care home population is an understudied and extremely vulnerable group (The stroke Association 2011). The research suggests that prevention can reduce the risk of a stroke and that life style changes and rehabilitation will help with the recovery process, learning to deal with the effects that the stroke has had on them and learning to adapt to the limitations caused by stroke. Rehabilitation would also address the need for any support in dealing with social, emotional and practical issues. A government report on long term health conditions and self care (Your health, your way, 2009) is aimed at promoting discussion between health and social care professionals and people with long term health conditions, it addresses what options, support and information are available for health care users who wish to self care. The N.H.S. and social services want to encourage people with long term health conditions to self care, its shared aims and values for the transformation are to ensure that service users and their carers are not discriminated because of illness or disability and are supported to be able to: Live independently and be able to sustain a family unit, which will avoid children taken on inappropriate caring roles. To stay healthy and to be able to recover quickly from illness. The ability to exercise control over their own life and if appropriate the lives of family members. To participate economically and socially as active and equal citizens. Have the best quality of life, irrespective of illness or disability and retaining respect and dignity. (Your health, your way, 2009, p.4) Self care is build around a holistic process that places the service user at the centre of their own care but also recognising that different issues can impact on an individuals health and wellbeing so the process is supportive, individual, flexible and non-judgemental, the focus is solely on enabling the individual to achieve the outcomes that they want for themselves. People who use services completed a survey prior the transition to self care and after the changes had occurred the findings are. (Your health, your way, 2009) (Your health, your way, 2009) The results show how being empowered to take a more active role in health and well-being can improve quality of life. People who are living with a long term condition can benefit enormously from being supported to self care. They can live longer, have less pain, anxiety, depression and fatigue, have a better quality of life and be more active and independent (Your health, your way, 2009, p.6). Theory and practice. The social model of disability (K217, Learning Guide 6, p43) plays a significant part in a care service users life, such as Kingsley. This theory accepts that people will experience differences in life because of health issues such as stroke and diabetes, but questions that the difference is the problem when society does not adapt to such differences. The theory was introduced in the 1970s when disabled activists debated that society is the problem that faced disabled people not the individuals disability. This approach has a commitment to improving the lives of disabled people, by promoting social inclusion and removing the barriers which oppress disabled people (Tom Shakespeare, 2006, p 9). The biomedical paradigm ignores the differences between individuals and is criticised for overlooking social influences which have an effect to health care (K217, Learning Guide 2, p40). This is clear in the case of Kingsley; he has received biomedical treatment in the past for type 2 diabetes and now for a stroke from medical practitioners. Kingsley is now experiencing differences in life to an able bodied person as well as a change to his identity to being disabled because he cannot walk or use his right hand without being aided. The nursing home were Kingsley now lives accepts his disabilities and provides care for him such as assistance to walk and use his right hand. Two people assist Kingsley to get out of bed, shower and dress him. The environment is restricting his independence and making him disabled relying on assistance and there are no aids he can use himself which would give him control of his care. Empowering people who use services (K217, Learning Guide 10, pp28-34) is a theory which would allow Kingsley to become involved in his health care needs. The focus of the theory is the concern regarding the need for people to participate in their health care needs, and that empowerment will encourage them to use services and empower them to participate within them. People need to be encouraged to use health care services but also need to empower themselves to participate within a service. Health and social care services encourage users to become empowered; this can be with support groups with people who share similar experiences (Diabetes NHS, 2011). Key factors of the theory are that power and control should be equally divided between service provider and user, several options will be available to the user which there will have knowledge on, information supplied to assist in making decisions and if the user is dissatisfied with the system has the option to decline any further use of the system and make a complaint. Involving people who use health and social care services with empowerment gives them achievement by (K217, Learning Guide 10, p30). Having control and being engaged with services. Equal share of power with practitioners. The contribution of planning individual services and the development of good practice. Including all members of society. Empowerments goal is to involve participation at all levels in care services allowing users to have a say and to be engaged in their care needs working with practitioners to satisfy care needs. Empowerment is a way of equalising the distribution of power between users of services and practitioners (Tuner, MacKian, Woodthorpe, 2010, quoted in Learning guide 10, p.30). Kingsleys care needs are being dictated to him by the care home and his social worker if he was to be empowered to use care services and was to empower to participate in services he may be more actively contented with his care needs. Conclusions and recommendations Who cares for Kingsley and where he receives care are now important decisions to make. The decisions will influence his care needs and his future wellbeing. This report highlights the concerns that people who have long term health conditions face with care needs and the services that provide care. Clearly when a person suffers from an illness such as a stroke or diabetes an emergency response for care is received from a medical practitioner who will offer a biomedical diagnoses and if needed medical treatment and medication. As was the treatment Kingsley received, the next phase in the care process is how after care support and treatment is provided for people with a long term health condition. Kingsleys individual care needs have not been addressed; he may be adequately receiving biomedical care in the nursing home and his basic fundamental needs for living such as shelter, food and warmth are being provided his individual needs are not being considered. Kingsley wishes to return home to the care of his wife, a psycho sociological perspective will identify that his individual psychological health and wellbeing in society is not being fulfilled. The care home environment is restricting him from participating in main stream society; he cannot be active within society because he has no access to social networks. This will be a fundamental reason for his bouts of anger and frustration as before his illness he was social active and provided for his family. Kingsleys care needs are unique to his new identity as a disabled person with a long term health condition, along with a psycho sociological perspective a holistic approach will help to identify the impact this is having on his health, lifestyle and wellbeing. The social worker assigned to Kingsley is concerned that his wife would not be able to cope with his care needs, one option is to recognise what difficulties in society will be restricting Kingsley because of his disability (The social model of disability). The care home is disabling Kingsley because of its lack of practices and environment. If the social worker was to work with Kingsley and his wife to identify the support needed to provide a self care package such as direct payments (K217, Learning Guide 10, p29) this would allow them to be independently in control over which services they use. Allowing them to live independently as a family and able to participate economically within society.

Free Terrorism Essays: We Must Oppose Peaceniks :: September 11 Terrorism Essays

We Must Oppose Peaceniks There is a certain segment of the population on any contemporary college campus that is never satisfied unless it is dissatisfied. So addicted is this small minority to the rush one receives from righteous indignation that, after centuries of moral progress in what is by now a relatively just society, their lives are reduced to a desperate search for sufficiently eye-catching evils to combat. Sweatshops one year, the low wages of University workers the next - while collegiate activism addicts often find themselves fighting real and continuing injustices, their brief battles are mere momentary fads, reduced to being the political equivalent of bellbottoms or boy bands. In the middle of the 2001 fall fashion season, however - a season which was supposed to bring with it both shorter hemlines and renewed opposition to the IMF - Americans witnessed evil in its purest and most dramatic form. Here, finally, was a genuine need for immediate action. Habitual activists thus joined their fellow students in giving blood and helping to organize aid for the victims of the tragedy, and I applaud them for their good work. Horrified at for once being part of a moral majority, however, this coterie soon found that the relief effort was insufficient to satisfy its old addiction. A real jolt of righteous indignation, it seems, comes only from a stance directly opposed to that of the American mainstream, or, as they like to call it, the capitalist hegemony. The movementarians needed to find a new, less popular movement for themselves, and sure enough one was to be found with relative ease - a late '60s classic that never goes out of style, one by the name of "peace." Generally speaking, I too am in favor of peace. (For the record, I'm generally well to the left of Joe Lieberman.) Not only would I take a state of peace over a state of war any day, I am also opposed to such military tactics as the invasion of randomly selected developing nations or the wholesale slaughter of their innocent civilians. Except for those with a religiously grounded commitment to absolute pacifism, however, we can all agree that there are times when certain acts of war are both appropriate and just. The vast majority of the American people believe that now is one of those times, and they are right to do so.

Carrie Chapter One

News item from the Westover (Me.) weekly Enterprise, August 19, 1966: RAIN OF STONES REPORTED It was reliably reported by several persons that a rain of stones fell from a clear blue sky on Carlin Street in the town of Chamberlain on August 17th. The stones fell principally on the home of Mrs Margaret White, damaging the roof extensively and ruining two gutters and a downspout valued at approximately $25. Mrs White, a widow, lives with her three-year-old daughter, Carietta. Mrs White could not be reached for comment. Nobody was really surprised when it happened, not really, not at the subconscious level where savage things grow. On the surface, all the girls in the shower room were shocked, thrilled, ashamed, or simply glad that the White bitch had taken it in the mouth again. Some of them might also have claimed surprise, but of course their claim was untrue. Carrie had been going to school with some of them since the first grade, and this had been building since that time, building slowly and immutably, in accordance with all the laws that govern human nature, building with all the steadiness of a chain reaction approaching critical mass. What none of them knew, of course, was that Carrie White was telekinetic. Graffiti scratched on a desk of the Barker Street Grammar school in Chamberlain: Carrie White eats shit. The locker room was filled with shouts, echoes, and the subterranean sound of showers splashing on tile. The girls had been playing volleyball in Period One, and their morning sweat was light and eager. Girls stretched and writhed under the hot water, squalling, flicking water, squirting white bars of soap from hand to hand. Carrie stood among them stolidly a frog among swans. She was a chunky girl with pimples on her neck and back and buttocks, her wet hair completely without colour. It rested against her face with dispirited sogginess and she simply stood, head slightly bent, letting the water splat against her flesh and roll off. She looked the part of the sacrificial goat, the constant butt, believer in left-handed monkey wrenches, perpetual foul-up, and she was. She wished forlornly and constantly that Ewen High had individual-and thus private-showers, like the high schools at Andover or Boxford. They stared. They always stared. Showers turning off one by one, girls stepping out, removing pastel bathing caps, towelling, spraying deodorant, checking the clock over the door. Bras were hooked, underpants stepped into. Steam hung in the air; the place might have been an Egyptian bathhouse except for the constant rumble of the Jacuzzi whirlpool bath in the corner. Calls and catcalls rebounded with all the snap and flicker of billiard balls after a hard break. ‘-so Tommy said he hated it on me and I-‘ ‘-I'm going with my sister and her husband. He picks his nose but so does she, so they're very-‘ ‘-shower after school and-‘ ‘-too cheap to spend a goddam penny so Cindi and I-‘ Miss Desjardin, their slim, nonbreasted gym teacher, stepped in, craned her-neck around briefly, and slapped her hands together once, smartly. ‘What are you waiting for, Carrie? Doom? Bell in five minutes.' Her shorts were blinding white, her legs not too curved but striking in their unobtrusive muscularity. A silver whistle, won in college archery competition, hung around her neck. The girls giggled and Carrie looked up, her eyes slow and dazed from the heat and the steady, pounding roar of the water. ‘Ohuh?' It was a strangely froggy sound, grotesquely apt, and the girls giggled again. Sue Snell had whipped a towel from her hair with the speed of a magician embarking on a wondrous feat and began to comb rapidly. Miss Desjardin made an irritated cranking gesture at Carrie and stepped out. Carrie turned off the shower. It died in a drip and a gurgle. It wasn't until she stepped out that they all saw the blood running down her leg. From The Shadow Exploded. Documented Facts and Specific Conclusions Derived from the Case of Carietta White, by David R. Congress (Tulane University Press: 1981), p. 34: It can hardly be disputed that failure to note specific instances of telekinesis during the White girl's earlier years must be attributed to the conclusions offered by White and Steams in their paper Telekinesis: A Wild Talent Revisited-that the ability to move objects by effort of the will alone comes to the fore only in moments of extreme personal stress. The talent is well hidden indeed; how else could it have remained submerged for centuries with only the tip of the iceberg showing above a sea of quackery? We have only skimpy hearsay evidence upon which to lay our foundation in this case, but even this is enough to indicate that a ‘TK' potential of immense magnitude existed within Carrie White. The great tragedy is that we are now all Monday-morning quarterbacks †¦ ‘Per-iod!' The catcall came first from Chris Hargensen. It struck the tiled walls, rebounded, and struck again. Sue Snell gasped laughter from her nose and felt an odd, vexing mixture of hate, revulsion, exasperation, and pity. She just looked so dumb, standing there, not knowing what was going on. God, you'd think she never ‘PER-iod!' It was becoming a chant, an incantation. Someone in the back-ground (perhaps Hargensen again, Sue couldn't tell in the jungle of echoes) was yelling ‘Plug it up!' with hoarse, uninhibited abandon. ‘PER-iod, PER-iod, PER-iod!' Carrie stood dumbly in the centre of a forming circle, water rolling from her skin in beads. She stood like a patient ox, aware that the joke was on her (as always), dumbly embarrassed but unsurprised. Sue felt welling disgust as the first dark drops of menstrual blood struck the tile in dime-sized drops. ‘For God's sake Carrie, you got your period!' Sue cried. ‘Clean yourself up!' ‘Ohuh?' She looked around bovinely. Her hair stuck to her cheeks in a curving helmet shape. There was a cluster of acne on one shoulder. At sixteen, the elusive stamp of hurt was already marked clearly in her eyes. ‘She thinks they're for lipstick!' Ruth Grogan suddenly shouted with cryptic glee, and then burst into a shriek of laughter. Sue remembered the comment later and fitted it Into a general picture, but now it was only another senseless sound in the confusion. Sixteen? She was thinking. She must know what's happening, she†¦ More droplets of blood. Carrie still blinked around at her classmates in slow bewilderment. Helen Shyres turned around and made mock throwingup gestures. ‘You're bleeding!' Sue yelled suddenly, furiously. ‘You're bleeding, you big dumb pudding!' Carrie looked down at herself. She shrieked. The sound was very loud in the humid locker room. A tampon suddenly struck her in the chest and fell with a plop at her feet. A red flower stained the absorbent cotton and spread. Then the laughter, disgusted, contemptuous, horrified, seemed to rise and bloom into something jagged and ugly, and the girls were bombarding her with tampons and sanitary napkins, some from purses, some from the broken dispenser on the wall. They flew like snow and the chant became: ‘Plug it up. Plug it up. Plug it-‘ Sue was throwing them too, throwing and chanting with the rest, not really sure what she was doing – a charm had occurred to her mind and it glowed there like neon: There's no harm in it really no harm in it really no harm-It was still flashing and glowing, reassuringly, when Carrie suddenly began to howl and back away, flailing her arms and grunting and gobbling. The girls stopped, realizing that fission and explosion had finally been reached. It was at this point, when looking back, that some of them would claim surprise. Yet there had been all these years, all these years of let's short-sheet Carrie's bed at Christian Youth Camp and I found this love letter from Carrie to Flash Bobby Pickett let's copy it and pass it around and hide her underpants somewhere and put this snake in her shoe and duck her again, duck her again: Carrie tagging along stubbornly on biking trips, known one year as pudd'n and the next year as truck-face, always smelling sweaty, not able to catch up; catching poison ivy from urinating in the bushes and everyone finding out (hey, scratch-ass, your bum itch?). Billy Preston putting peanut butter in her hair that time she fell asleep in study hall; the pinches, the legs outstretched in school aisles to trip her up, the books knocked from her desk, the obscene postcard tucked into her purse; Carrie on the church picnic an d kneeling down clumsily to pray and the seam of her old madras skirt splitting along the zipper like the sound of a huge windbreakage; Carrie always missing the ball, even in kickball, failing on her face in Modern Dancing during their sophomore year and chipping a tooth, running into the net during volleyball; wearing stockings that were always run, running, or about to run, always showing sweat stains under the arms of her blouses; even the time Chris Hargensen called up after school from the Kelly Fruit Company downtown and asked her if she knew that pig poop was spelled C-A-R-R-I-E: Suddenly all this and the critical mass was reached. The ultimate shit-on, grossout, put-down, long searched for, was found. Fission. She backed away, howling in the new silence, fat forearms crossing her face, a tampon stuck in the middle of her pubic hair. The girls watched her, their eyes shining solemnly. Carrie backed into the side of one of the four large shower compartments and slowly collapsed into a sitting position. Slow, helpless groans jerked out of her. Her eyes rolled with wet whiteness, like the eyes of a hog in the slaughtering pen. Sue said slowly, hesitantly: ‘I think this must be the first time she ever-‘ That was when the door pumped open with a flat and hurried bang and Miss Desjardin burst in to see what the matter was. From The Shadow Exploded (p. 41): Both medical and psychological writers on the subject are in agreement that Carrie White's exceptionally late and traumatic commencement of the menstrual cycle might well have provided the trigger for her latent talent. It seems incredible that, as late as 1979, Carrie knew nothing of the mature woman's monthly cycle. It is nearly as incredible to believe that the girl's mother would permit her daughter to reach the age of nearly seventeen without consulting a gynaecologist concerning the daughter's failure to menstruate. Yet the facts are incontrovertible. When Carrie White realized she was bleeding from the vaginal opening, she had no idea of what was taking place. She was innocent of the entire concept of menstruation. One of her surviving classmates, Ruth Grogan, tells of entering the girls' locker room at Ewen High School the year before the events we are concerned with and seeing Carrie using a tampon to blot her lipstick with. At that time Miss Grogan said: ‘What the hell are you up to?' Miss White replied: ‘Isn't this right?' Miss Grogan then replied: ‘Sure. Sure it is.' Ruth Grogan let a number of her girl friends in on this (she later told this interviewer she thought it was ‘sorta cute'), and if anyone tried in the future to inform Carrie of the true purpose of what she was using to make up with, she apparently dismissed the explanation as an attempt to pull her leg. This was a facet of her life that she had become exceedingly wary of†¦ When the girls were gone to their Period Two classes and the bell had been silenced (several of them had slipped quietly out the back door before Miss Desjardin could begin to take names), Miss Desjardin employed the standard tactic for hysterics: She slapped Carrie smartly across the face. She hardly would have admitted the pleasure the act gave her, and she certainly would have denied that she regarded Carrie as a fat, whiny bag of lard. A first-year teacher, she still believed that she thought all children were good. Carrie looked up at her dumbly, face still contorted and working. ‘M-M-Miss D-D-Des-D-‘ ‘Get up,' Miss Desjardin said dispassionately. ‘Get up and tend to yourself.' ‘I'm bleeding to death!' Carrie screamed, and one blind, searching hand came up and clutched Miss Desjardin's white shorts. It left a bloody handprint. ‘I †¦ you . . .' The gym teacher's face contorted into a pucker of disgust, and she suddenly hurled Came, stumbling, to her feet ‘Get over there!' Carrie stood swaying between the showers and the wall with its dime sanitary-napkin dispenser, slumped over, breasts pointing at the floor, her arms dangling limply. She looked like an ape. Her eyes were shiny and blank. ‘Now,' Miss Desjardin said with hissing, deadly emphasis, ‘you take one of those napkins out †¦ no, never mind the coin slot, it's broken anyway†¦ take one and†¦ damn it, will you do it! You act as if you never had a period before.' ‘Period?' Carrie said. Her expression of complete unbelief was too genuine, too full of dumb and hopeless horror, to be ignored or denied. A terrible and black foreknowledge grew in Rita Desjardin's mind. It was incredible, could not be. She herself had begun menstruation shortly after her eleventh birthday and had gone to the head of the stairs to yell down excitedly: ‘Hey, Mum, I'm on the rag!' ‘Carrie?' she said now. She advanced toward the girl. ‘Carrie?' Carrie flinched away. At the same instant, a rack of softball bats in the corner fell over with a large, echoing bang. They rolled every which way, making Desjardin jump. ‘Carrie, is this your first period?' But now that the thought had been admitted, she hardly had to ask. The blood was dark and flowing with terrible heaviness. Both of Carrie's legs were smeared and splattered with it, as though she had waded through a river of blood. ‘It hurts,' Carrie groaned. ‘My stomach †¦' ‘That passes,' Miss Desjardin said. Pity and self-shame met in her and mixed uneasily. ‘You have to †¦ uh, stop the flow of blood. You-‘ There was a bright flash overhead, followed by a flashgunlike pop as a lightbulb sizzled and went out. Miss Desjardin cried out with surprise, and it occurred to her (the whole damn place is falling in) that this kind of thing always seemed to happen around Carrie when she was upset, as if bad luck dogged her every step. The thought was gone almost as quickly as it had come. She took one of the sanitary napkins from the broken dispenser and unwrapped it. ‘Look,' she said, ‘Like this-‘ From The Shadow Exploded (p. 54): Carrie White's mother, Margaret White, gave birth to her daughter on September 21, 1963, under circumstances which can only be termed bizarre. In fact, an overview of the Came White case leaves the careful student with one feeling ascendant over all others: that Carrie was the only issue of a family as odd as any that has ever been brought to popular attention. As noted earlier, Ralph White died in February of 1963 when a steel girder fell out of a carrying sling on a housing-project job in Portland. Mrs White continued to live alone in their suburban Chamberlain bungalow. Due to the White's near-fanatical fundamentalist religious beliefs, Mrs White had no friends to see her through her period of bereavement. And when her labour began seven months later, she was alone. At approximately 1:30 P.M. on September 21, the neighbours on Carlin Street began to hear screams from the White bungalow. The police, however, were not summoned to the scene until after 6:00 P.M. We are left with two unappetizing alternatives to explain this time lag: Either Mrs White's neighbours on the street did not wish to become involved in a police investigation, or dislike for her had become so strong that they deliberately adopted a wait-and-see attitude. Mrs Georgia McLaughlin, the only one of the three remaining residents who were on the street at that time and who would talk to me, said that she did not call the police because she thought the screams had something to do with ‘holy rollin'.' When the police did arrive at 6:22 P.M. the screams had become irregular. Mrs White was found in her bed upstairs, and the investigating officer, Thomas G. Mearton. at first thought she had been the victim of an assault. The bed was drenched with blood, and a butcher knife lay on the floor. It was only then that he saw the baby, still partially wrapped in the placental membrane, at Mrs White's breast. She had apparently cut the umbilical cord herself with the knife. It staggers both imagination and belief to advance the hypothesis that Mrs Margaret White did not know she was pregnant, or even understand what the word entails, and recent scholars such as J. W. Bankson and George Felding have made a more reasonable case for the hypothesis that the concept, linked irrevocably in her mind with the ‘sin' of intercourse, had been blocked entirely from her mind. She may simply have refused to believe that such a thing could happen to her. We have records of at least three letters to a friend in Kenosha, Wisconsin, that seem to prove conclusively that Mrs White believed, from her fifth month on, that she had ‘a cancer of the womanly parts' and would soon join her husband in heaven †¦ When Miss Desjardin led Carrie up to the office fifteen minutes later, the halls were mercifully empty. Classes droned onwards behind closed doors. Carrie's shrieks had finally ended, but she had continued to weep with steady regularity. Desjardin had finally placed the napkin herself, cleaned the girl up with wet paper towels, and gotten her back into her plain cotton underpants. She tried twice to explain the commonplace reality of menstruation, but Carrie clapped her hands over her ears and continued to cry. Mr Morton, the assistant principal, was out of his office in a flash when they entered. Billy deLois and Henry Trennant, two boys waiting for the lecture due them for cutting French I, goggled around from their chairs. ‘Come in,' Mr Morton said briskly. ‘Come right in.' He glared over Desjardin's shoulder at the boys, who were staring at the bloody handprint on her shorts. ‘What are YOU looking at?' ‘Blood,' Henry said, and smiled with a kind of vacuous surprise. ‘Two detention periods,' Morton snapped. He glanced down at the bloody handprint and blinked. He closed the door behind them and began pawing through the top drawer of his filing cabinet for a school accident form. ‘Are you all right, uh-?' ‘Carrie,' Desjardin supplied. ‘Carrie White.' Mr Morton had finally located an accident form. There was a large coffee stain on it. ‘You won't need that, Mr Morton.' ‘I suppose it was the trampoline. We just †¦ I won't?' ‘No. But I think Carrie should be allowed to go home for the rest of the day. She's had a rather frightening experience.' Her eyes flashed a signal which he caught but could not interpret. ‘Yes, okay, if you say so. Good. Fine.' Morton crumpled the form back into the filing cabinet, slammed it shut with his thumb in the drawer, and grunted. He whirled gracefully to the door, yanked it open, glared at Billy and Henry, and called: ‘Miss Fish, could we have a dismissal slip here, please? Carrie Wright.' ‘White,' said Miss Desjardin. ‘White,' Morton agreed. Billy deLois sniggered. ‘Week's detention!' Morton barked. A blood blister was forming under his thumbnail. Hurt like hell. Carrie's steady, monotonous weeping went on and on. Miss Fish brought the yellow dismissal slip and Morton scrawled his initials on it with his silver pocket pencil, wincing at the pressure on his wounded thumb. ‘Do you need a ride, Cassie?' he asked. ‘We can call a cab if you need one.' She shook her head. He noticed with distaste that a large bubble of green mucus had formed at one nostril. Morton looked over her head and at Miss Desjardin.

Amazon’s Competitive Analysis Essay

Competitors are the firms that compete to serve the same customers in the same marketplace. Competitors can compete directly or indirectly. Competition happens on two levels: Product or service competition. Due to the shift of focus for Amazon, it has become the â€Å"Earth’s biggest anything store†. Its competitors have expanded from just online book retailers Barnes and Nobles and Borders to top audio retailers CDNOW.com and online auction house e-bay.com. Amazon has an overall lead of 40% market share against the other online retail firms. Their international business has more than doubled over the past 2 years Amazon’s primary value chain includes purchasing/sourcing, marketing, distribution and after-sales services, which includes returns and exchanges from unsatisfied customers. Their main focus is in the purchasing/sourcing and in the distribution of the products to the consumers. Their investments are therefore, geared towards warehouses in key points of high consumer demand areas and an efficient delivery and distributing system to service all its consumers. Thus, Amazon controls most of its distributing system that spans across borders. How does Amazon compete? Competes through Quality, service, and low price. How effective is each? Quality – they make sure that their product reach the customer with no damage and always serve their customer with the best product. Service – Amazon delivers the product within a week. Less lead time Low price – reasonable pricing. How powerful? Amazon is power because they were the first to start an online business. They have more customers due to this. The customers are loyal to Amazon and will do their shopping only at Amazon. Amazon is very profitable and is doing well currently. How aggressive? Amazon.com has remained on top of the online retailing business despite the entrance of giants such as Barnes and Nobles and Borders. Their success is attributed to two factors; timing and continuing to invest heavily into the inventory and distribution systems. Amazon, by being the first of its kind, has a big lead over the nearest competitors due to their experience and its reputation as the first movers. Their thrust remains on improving efficient delivery systems across borders and to build name recognition as the number one retailing firm in the Internet. They have also ventured into different retail options to keep that lead. Marketing, Innovative inventory and distribution systems, and name recall have helped Amazon build a sustainable competitive advantage. Will diversification into new markets finally turn a profit for Amazon.com before the dotcom godfather burns through the last of its savings? In five years Amazon.com has built the world’s biggest online store. However, despite generating expected $1bn ( £0.67bn) sales from the Christmas retail season alone, profit has proved elusive. Despite its profligate sales, business-to-consumer e-commerce’s pre-eminent player is not expected to enter the black until year-end, according to financial analysts’ most-optimistic forecasts. Meanwhile, a cost-intensive diversification strategy casts doubt on the prospect of the company ever turning a profit, according to a growing chorus of company-watchers. In order for any online retail company to remain prosperous and income generating, they must invest a lot of time and money into research and development of more efficient operations and distributions systems. This proved to be key for the Market Leader in online retailing, Amazon.Com. Conclusion – Many Amazon-watchers believe diversification will saddle the company with an unsustainable cost burden. â€Å"There is an incompatibility between its brand proposition of offering a dominant breadth of assortment and achieving profitability,† b. While the threat from dotcom upstarts has receded with their reduced ability to raise funds on the investment market, the challenge from bricks and mortar retailers adding online stores is getting fiercer. As well as wielding generous Internet war chests from established profitability, physical retailers will benefit from a maturation of the online market. The lunched of Amazon.com in July of 1995 was the creation of a new and bold way of doing business on the Internet. Amazon.com forced the traditional physical world brick and mortar retailer in the book industry to change the way they target the industry’s consumers and then epitomized Business-2-Consumer e-retailing. Although, Amazon.com started as an online bookstore, The bricks and clicks mantra revolves around the idea that the winning — and profitable — formula for electronic commerce success is leveraging the best of the physical and virtual worlds. In theory, it should give physical retailers venturing on to the Web an edge over pure dot-com e-commerce companies because they can efficiently extend their existing infrastructure and complement their real world stores. So far, the most successful retailers have been those that have taken an aggressive approach to the Internet like Amazon. The bricks-and-clicks model is gaining momentum as the e-commerce market matures. A growing number of retailers have finally gotten serious about doing business on-line, now that fast-moving dot-com players such as Amazon.com Inc., eBay Inc. and eToys Inc. have carved out market niches. By creating an independent on-line unit that has the freedom to develop its own merchandising and marketing strategies, Amazon has the freedom and flexibility to capitalize on opportunities. Toys â€Å"R† Us Inc. stumbled when  it decided to protect its stores and offer only a limited selection of merchandise on its Web site. That gave eToys and Amazon.com a window of opportunity to win customer loyalty and rapidly grow sales, while Toys â€Å"R† Us struggled to play catch-up. The Market is moving toward a system where it is no longer going to be only Internet or only bricks and mortar,† he says. â€Å"Amazon’s mandate is not focused on where the business was, but rather where the opportunities are.† Another model is being pursued by Peachtree Network Inc., which is creating an on-line grocery network across Canada. Rather than spend heavily to build warehouses and purchase delivery trucks, Peachtree offers a service to regional grocery chains that lets them provide consumers with an on-line ordering system. The grocers, which already have the infrastructure, process the orders and handle delivery. Amazon.com has parlayed its Internet expertise to compete very successfully against traditional â€Å"bricks & mortar† book retailers such as Barnes & Noble, and Borders; Price line has leveraged its e-commerce patents and business model to challenge the incumbent travel agent industry. Thus, the pure Internet plays are very well-positioned to leverage the Internet to overwhelm their incumbent competitors who are locked into their â€Å"bricks & mortar† channels. However this is not necessarily true for all industries. If an incumbent can update its business model and supporting organizational infrastructure, it can successfully leverage the Internet just as effectively. Companies that exist to engage in commerce in the Internet’s digital marketplaces are known as digital players. For example, Amazon.com exists as a digital player that uses digital processes to transact physical products such as books, and videotapes. By using the Internet as its sole marketing and support channel, Amazon.com has been able to avoid heavy â€Å"bricks and mortar† investments that weigh upon its physical competitors such as Barnes and Noble, and Borders. Incumbent competitors are beginning to establish their own websites so that they can continue to serve their clients who are already on the Internet, and also to serve new market segments. However the pure digital players, if they do not already have brand-recognition or are not affiliated with existing brand names, often have to invest significantly  in marketing and other promotional expenditures to gain consumer awareness. Market Entrants Leverage Disruptive Innovations Since market entrants by definition do not have established business models and distribution channels  with the related cost structures, they can exploit the strategic flexibility provided by disruptive innovations to devise business models and strategies to compete successfully in the emerging marketplace. Unlike the incumbents who have to work within the constraints of their existing business models, organizational structures, and cultures, these entrants can craft their business strategies based upon the unique enabling opportunities provided by the disruptive innovations.

Eli Whtiney essays

Eli Whtiney essays Eli Whitney and Interchangeable Parts The year was 1765. One of the most influential inventors in American history, Eli Whitney, was born in Westboro, Massachusetts. He contributed some of the greatest innovations to American society. There are many different situations that helped shape or inspire Eli. Being exposed to his father's workshop, Eli accumulated an immense amount of knowledge on craftsmanship and mechanics. During college, Whitney's experiences at Yale also had many influences on him. When his pursuit of a law degree failed he began to become distracted by his affinity for mechanics. He also received an education involving advanced science and graduated with honors. Whitney was probably most influenced, though, by earlier attempts at mass production. The British textile manufacturing process inspired him as did a French man named LeBlanc, who had attempted the process of interchangeability but died before seeing its effect. Even though Eli was not certain if it was his own genuine concept, he did obtain cre dit for putting the process into action. Though perhaps best known for his invention of the cotton gin, Eli Whitney's greatest accomplishment was successfully introducing interchangeable parts to America. Until then, every rifle's part had been hand made, thus the parts of one gun did not fit any other gun. Whitney made the parts to his rifles so nearly identical that the machine parts could be interchangeable from one gun to another. For each part of the gun, a template was made. Whitney then invented a machine that allowed a man to cut metal according to a pattern. It was composed of a wheel with its cutting teeth that were driven around the edge of the template. No expert mechanical skill was needed. This machine was known as the milling machine. He first tested his invention on muskets. The federal government's investment and support enabled Whitney to prove the feasibility of his system and establish it as the ...